


The Man Who Ten Has Moved

by 127ghouls



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Cliche, Crushes, Fluff, M/M, Unrequited Love, a lil johnten for reasons, idk why this happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-19 17:52:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19137703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/127ghouls/pseuds/127ghouls
Summary: Ten is the exception to his rule.





	The Man Who Ten Has Moved

**Author's Note:**

> just like the tag says, it's a mf cliché shit and idk why i wrote this

He doesn't usually get affected by things in general, whether they're positive or negative. Xiaojun even joked about him being apathetic, an AI designed to function like a normal human being ㅡ with the lack of proper emotions being the only defect. 

 

It's not his fault it's unusual for things to move him. Hendery thinks things are just shallow, and he's more into the deeper aspects of life. Talks about science and history can instigate something in him, a myriad of feelings consisting of excitement, confusion, anger, curiosity and attraction in some sense. 

 

But in every rule, like everyone knows, there is an exception. 

 

Ten is a seatmate in one of his classes. The man is Thai, a few centimeters shorter, has feline eyes and a sharp nose. His lips are thin and pink. They look soft. Hendery thinks they're soft. 

 

There isn't a lot that can move himㅡbut Ten is the exception to the rule. 

 

Hendery has no idea when and how he started crushing on Ten. One night after getting his own heart palpitating like he had downed mugs of coffee because his seatmate had laughed at his own misery, also known as tripping on his untied shoelace, Hendery sat on his bed with a notebook on his lap, listing down the possible reasons as to why Ten seems to be the colored constellation in his grayscale universe. 

 

By midnight, after an hour of self brainstorming, he had made twenty points on the notebook. All of them are why he yearns for Ten to talk to him everyday, to join him during lunch. Xiaojun had noticed the change. Hendery did nothing to deny the allegations. It's trueㅡhe likes Ten. 

 

At the end, he still doesn't know when the feeling blossomed. Maybe it doesn't matter. It bugs him, though. When he has to study, he thinks of Ten and his eye smile. Dinner with his family isn't the same anymore. He can't join his sisters in their chitchat, because all his mouth wants to talk about is a certain person, and they won't be able to relate to him. First, his sisters are straight. Second, he just doesn't know how to express the emotions using the most appropriate and heartfelt words. 

 

It's honestly such a bother. A burden. Probably the only burden he won't want to get rid of. 

 

He needs to let Ten know, though. Hendery supposes it's better than keeping everything in with the prospect of him exploding in the wrong place at the wrong time. Might as well confess as soon as possible. 

  
  
  
  


Not a lot of things could pull his heartstrings. But when the day of his planned confession came, and Hendery sees Ten holding hands in front of the classroom with a tall man he had never seen before, he decides that there are other things that possess the capability to stretch his heartstrings quite painfully. 

 

Ten looks happy with the guy. Hendery stands by the door, one hand gripping the strap of his bag while another crumples the letter he had written the night prior. It contains everything he wants to tell the Thai, but it looks like it'll go to waste. 

 

“It happens,” Xiaojun claps his back as a form of comfort. “We don't always get what we want.”

 

“We don't?” Hendery asks, eyes not leaving Ten's figure even as the latter walks away with the nameless guy. “But I always get what I wantㅡgrades, that guitar my sister bought me last week, and a trip to LA. Why can't I get Ten?” He faces his friend who sports a look he can't quite decipher. “Why?”

 

“Because Ten isn't an object.” Xiaojun deadpans, leaving him rooted on his spot with a disappointed shake of his head. 

 

The letter is received by the almost full trash bin at the end of the hallway, where a janitor collects to be disposed to an awaiting truck. 

  
  
  
  


Things with Ten are not the same since then. Hendery successfully excuses himself each time the Thai would invite him for lunch. When a partner project came up, Hendery was quick to sit next to Yangyang, the popular jock he claimed to dislike. Ten was nothing but confused, but he didn't probe. Besides, he and Hendery have not established such a label for their closeness. Perhaps, they're not actually friends to begin with. 

 

He thought distance would help him forget, but Hendery commits a rare mistake. He only longed to see Ten even more. Studying became even more difficult with a plethora of thoughts surrounding Ten, Ten, and none other than Ten fill every nook and cranny of his brain. Xiaojun eventually got sick of it, hitting the back of his head with a pillow. 

 

“Shut up! Your thoughts are so damn loud.”

 

“I didn't even say anything?” Hendery rebutts, frowning as he picks up the pillow. “Stop reading my mind I guess?”

 

“How am I gonna do that when you're already giving it away?” His roommate murmurs something unclear. “Weren't you just planning to tell him? Then tell him. You aren't exactly expecting him to like you back, are you?”

 

Hendery raises a brow, mindlessly scribbling on his textbook. “No.”

 

“Then tell him. You gotta let it out because I'm honestly sick of you moping around like a lovestruck idiot.”

 

“Hey!”

 

“That's true! Have you seen yourself?” Xiaojun grumbles as he shifts on his own bed in their shared dorm room. “Misery doesn't look cute on you.”

 

“Then what does?” With a softer tone, Hendery genuinely asks. 

 

“Figure that out yourself.”

  
  
  
  


Figuring things out he does. Hendery wastes no time. He rewrites the letter he disposed, and before Ten leaves the classroom when Economics ends, Hendery hands him the pink paper with a loudly drumming heart. 

 

“What's this?” Ten flips the envelope, chuckling. “Johnny's crazy. He left me a note last week, too. What are you, his messenger?”

 

“I wrote that.” Hendery's jaw clenches through heartbreak. 

 

Ten's smile falters. Tight-lipped, he opens the letter and scans through the two paragraphs ending with a  _ Yours, Dery ^^v _ . 

 

“I'm sorry.” 

 

Is all Ten says before Hendery has the letter back in his hands. Ten disappears from his view, and the new batch of students to use the room enters, drowning his thoughts of  _ I thought so, I knew it, I like you, Why not me _ with their cacophony. 

  
  
  
  
  


Ten changes seats with Yangyang 'til the end of the semester. They did not talk again for the rest of their college years. 

  
  
  
  
  


“Come on, we got our first paycheck. You know what to do with it?” Wiggling his brows, Xiaojun dangles the bill right at Hendery's face. “Get shitfaced. It's a friday night too!”

 

Hendery offers no attention, arranging folders in his cubicle. He puts his blazer on and grabs his bag, rolling his eyes at Xiaojun before leaving the vicinity of the company with a plan to faceplant on his bed through the weekend. He can't even afford to have fun. There's just so much work to do that their obnoxious boss dumped on their department literally thirty minutes ago. And no, he's not one to slave away with an unpaid overtime. 

 

His usual bus arrives at 5:15 sharp. Hendery pockets his card and walks to his usual seat, but today there's a little change to his routine. 

 

Ten peers at him with wide eyes. His mouth curls into a smile upon recognition, and quickly tears the earphones he has on. “Hey!” He greets, scooting to the window as a wordless invitation for Hendery to sit next to him.

 

His face doesn't give anything away when he settles down. It's been half a year since graduation, and two years since the rejection. Hendery thinks he's gotten better at the whole resting bitch face stuff, because Ten talks to him animatedly, asking how he is as though they didn't part in the most awkward way possible. 

 

“Oh yeah, my birthday's coming up next weekend. I didn't know you live here too! You should come, I'll introduce you to my friends.”

 

“To Johnny?” He blurts out with the straightest face ever. Ten sags visibly, pursing his lips with a shrug.

 

“Johnny's history. We ended things a year ago.”

 

_ Oh.  _

 

Hendery didn't press. It's a thing of the past anyway. He moved on after a month because he couldn't afford to let it swallow him up and occupy all of him. Nothing had been able to affect him so much, not even the first love sitting right next to him. 

 

Yeah, not even Ten. 

 

They exchange numbers. Hendery gets off the bus first and doesn't look back. He doesn't see Ten staring at him. 

 

For the whole week he forced himself to focus on whatever project they have to finish before the deadline. Xiaojun, as usual is updated with Hendery's life more than his own, and has supported himㅡhe reiterated that he's not planning to get burned by an old flame twice. 

 

Which backfires immediately. 

 

Because he gets drunk at Ten's party, totally shitfaced, and wakes up the next day wearing nothing but socks on a soft bed, and Ten is equally naked beside him.

 

“Is this the part where I need to explain?” Ten begins, covering himself with his blanket. He feels his ass sting from the movement. 

 

Hendery's head throbs like a whole marching band with gigantic ass drums, the pain on his temple pulsating like a bitch. “We're not kids. I know we fucked. Now let's move on.” Even though the place spins, he drags himself out of bed, collecting the strewn clothes on the floor. “Holy fuck I'm on spirals.” 

 

Apparently, the Thai man doesn't take the nonchalance quite well. Ten ignores the discomfort on the bottom of his spine and puts on some boxers, hopefully it's his because Hendery isn't even looking at whatever he's wearing. “You're an asshole.”

 

His ears ring. Hendery glares through his fringe. “Don't start with me. We got drunk and had sex. That's all. We just met after two goddamn years, Ten. What do you want me to do?” His arm shoots through the wrong shirt hole. “Invite you out for a date?”

 

“Why not?”

 

Hendery slips the same arm through the neck hole this time and lets the shirt hang that way as he stares back at Ten who's nibbling nervously on his lower lip, hands wringing. 

 

His head is this close to exploding. Maybe his heart too. He never really completely buried those feelings, he realizes. The same old molten flame is already licking at him, begging to burn him to ashes. 

 

And he lets it. 

  
  
  
  
  


The ambiance of the restaurant is supposed to help him relax but he feels otherwise. He's restless in his seat as he waits for Ten, dismissing the waiter for the third time. 

 

Ten is half an hour late.

 

He arrives though, hair in disarray, a little out of breath. 

 

“There's a minor road accident. I got off to run here because it doesn't look like we're moving 'til dusk.”

 

Hendery takes his sweet time to look at the man across. Ten did not change at all. All of the things that managed to make his heart skip a beat before still works to this date. 

 

“Hendery?” Ten snaps a finger, amusement gleaming in his eyes. “You're zoning out.”

 

“You're really pretty.”

 

Pink, his favorite color, coats Ten's cheeks. Before, Hendery doesn't know why he likes the color. Maybe he found a reason now. 

 

“That was the first thing you said on the letter.”

 

“Will you apologize to me again?”

 

“We'll see.” 

  
  
  
  
  


Ten dates. It took them ten dates, once a week for the jitters caused by anxiety to take a toll on Hendery and abruptly meet Ten on a Tuesday night. 

 

“Do you like me?” 

 

“Yes.”

 

“Will you be my boyfriend?”

 

Ten pulls him by the collar, kissing him square on the mouth. “Please.” 

 

Xiaojun's right, Ten is not an object one could just take because of a  _ want.  _ Ten is a dream that one needs to cross seas for, a rewarding dream one has to diligently wait for. 

 

“I'm not bottoming this time.”

 

Hendery groans, head resting on his boyfriend's shoulder. “Fine, fine, whatever you want.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
